Tuesday, October 30, 2012

You guys deserve a round of applause. I know what it's like to battle the elements to get to work; I lived in Chicago for a decade or so. But I never had both a blackout and flooded streets to deal with.

Here's just one of the APT updates they are still spitting out, high above the soaked streets of Manhattan.

Looking ahead at my own hybrid of APT listings and press announcements for likely First Quarter NBC Prime schedules, I see no mention of either Fashion Star or Do No Harm. Both were previously announced as running on Sundays in mid-season.. sure doesn't look like it now.

SERIES PREMIERES:-- New Drama “Deception” (Formerly “Infamous”) January 7-- New Comedy “1600 Penn” January 10 -- New Relationship Series "Ready for Love" from Eva Longoria March 31 ANTICIPATED RETURNS:-- “The Voice” Begins Fourth Cycle March 25/26 -- The Season's Newest Hit “Revolution” Returns March 25 -- "The Biggest Loser" Weighs in January 6/7 with Return of Jillian Michaels-- “Smash” Dances Back to the Schedule February 5 with Oscar Winner Jennifer Hudson -- “Community” Returns February 7--“The Celebrity Apprentice” Debuts March 3-- “Betty White’s Off Their Rockers” Comes Back January 8

The new drama “Deception” – starring Meagan Good
(“Think Like a Man”), Victor Garber (“Alias”), Tate Donovan (“Damages”)
and Katherine LaNasa (“Alfie”) in a dark family murder mystery --
debuts on January 7 (10-11 p.m. ET). Preceding “Deception” is the new
season of “The Biggest Loser” which returns with a two-night premiere on
Sunday, January 6 (9-11 p.m. ET) and Monday, January 7 (8-10 p.m. ET),
and will continue on Mondays (8-10 p.m. ET) until the return of "The
Voice."

“The Voice” maintains its momentum as it returns March
25 for a fourth season (8-10 p.m. ET) and Tuesday, March 26 (8-9 p.m.
ET). It continues its two-night Monday/Tuesday schedule as it did this
fall. “Revolution” -- the season’s only bona fide new hit series --
will return and follow “The Voice” on March 25 (10-11 p.m. ET) when it
concludes its current fall broadcast dates in November.

Tuesdays:

Last
year’s acclaimed musical drama “Smash” makes its much-anticipated
return with a two-hour episode on February 5 (9-11 p.m. ET) -- with
Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson -- and will resume on Tuesday, February 12
(10-11 p.m. ET) in its regular day and time. “Betty White’s Off Their
Rockers” premieres on January 8 with back-to-back episodes (8-8:30 p.m.
ET and 8:30-9 p.m. ET) and will continue in that hour each Tuesday.

“The Voice” also will return on Tuesdays on March 26 (8-9 p.m. ET).

Thursdays:

The
new comedy “1600 Penn” -- starring Bill Pullman (“Independence Day”),
Jenna Elfman (“Dharma and Greg”) and Josh Gad (Broadway’s “The Book of
Mormon”) as a typical American family who just happen to live in the
White House -- debuts on January 10 (9:30-10 p.m. ET). Jason Winer,
Emmy-winning director of "Modern Family" is co-creator and director.
The critically hailed comedy “Community” returns on February 7 (8-8:30
p.m. ET). “Parks and Recreation” moves up one hour on the Thursday
schedule to 8:30-9 p.m. (ET) on January 17.

Sundays:

The
new alternative series “Ready for Love” -- an innovative and dramatic
new relationship show about making real connections with executive
producer Eva Longoria – premieres Sunday, March 31 (8-10 p.m. ET).
Donald Trump’s “The Celebrity Apprentice” resumes with an “All-Star”
edition of former celebrity contestants on March 3 (9-11 p.m. ET) for
four weeks before continuing in one-hour episodes on Sunday, March 31
(10-11 p.m. ET).

RatingBook.com clients will be updated today, but as nothing above has yet appeared in APT, expect details later. Oh, yeah... what they said: "Further scheduling announcements will be forthcoming."

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif. – October 17, 2012 – NBC has
named Steve Kern the network’s Senior Vice President, Program Planning
& Scheduling, NBC Entertainment. The announcement was made today by
Jeff Bader, President, Program Planning, Strategy and Research, NBC
Entertainment, to whom he will report.

Kern most recently was
Vice President, Program Planning & Scheduling, ABC Entertainment,
where he worked with Bader for 12 years.

In his role at NBC,
he will be responsible for planning and directing the program scheduling
function for NBC’s primetime scripted, Alternative and Late Night
programming.

"Steve's experience in Scheduling combined with
his broad knowledge of the Network Television business will make him a
valuable addition to the NBC team," said Bader.

During his
time at ABC from 2000 to the present, Kern was a vital component of the
team involved in key network program schedule moves, such as the launch
of ABC's successful Wednesday night comedy block anchored by "The
Middle" and "Modern Family" in 2009.

Earlier, Kern served as
Executive Director of Program Planning and Scheduling. He joined ABC in
2000, having previously held management roles in research or scheduling
at Fox Sports Net (as Manager, Program Planning & Scheduling),
Warner Bros. TV (as Manager of Research) and Columbia TriStar TV
Distribution (as Senior Analyst, Research).

Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that
the network has decided to air the pricey $10 million pilot, which has
been in development for two years, as a Halloween special. Mockingbird Lane will air Friday, Oct. 26 at 8 p.m. before Grimm (Oct. 31 is a Wednesday).

NBC declined to comment.

Each DMA is different.

Ok, just in case, my clients have inventory and selling book estimates. See above for an example already in use by one of my clients.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif. – October 10, 2012 – NBC will pack more punch
to its “Knockout” rounds of “The Voice” by airing two-hour original
episodes on back-to-back nights on Monday, October 29 (8-10 p.m. ET) and
Tuesday, October 30 (8-10 p.m. ET) for a total of four hours of
“Knockouts” that week.

In addition, on October 30, the network
will move back the broadcast times for original episodes of the new
comedies “Go On” (10-10:30 p.m. ET) and “The New Normal” (10:30-11 p.m.
ET) for one night.

Wonder when we will see this on APT. Our clients already have two new "specials" in inventory, and new estimates have been created for the longer episode of Voice and the later run of sitcoms.

Notice all the recent announcements of shows beginning 1 minute after the hour?

REVOLUTION moves to 10:01:00 (previously scheduled at 10:00:00) and is now 58:30 in duration (previously 59:30

Yet another sign that NBC is now willing to play, in 60 second increments, with start times and over-runs. Could this be a shift of NBC watching more minute-by-minute data of some kind, and playing within the new rules? Don't think there's evil intent here, but it bears watching.

Monday, October 8, 2012

But late
Monday, NBC released news that both “Community” and another comedy
slated for Fridays, “Whitney,” which were scheduled to have their season
premieres on Oct. 19, will have their start dates delayed indefinitely.

NBC’s statement said:

“Without
having to launch these comedies on Friday at this time, we can keep our
promotion focused on earlier in the week — plus we will have both
comedies in our back pocket if we need to make any schedule changes on
those nights. When we have a better idea of viewing patterns in the next
few weeks, we will announce new season premieres of ‘Whitney’ and
‘Community.’ ”

Just a guess, but maybe Revolution or Grimm encores instead? That's what's filling the time period now. At this moment, APT still shows the premiere episodes listed, but that's likely to change tomorrow.

Tuesday 7am PDT update: Still no alternative programming listed in APT, nor has there been an announcement on APT2Go.

Wednesday 7am PDT update: Community and Whitney are both still listed this morning in APT for October 19th. Our client inventories were modified yesterday to allow for either an encore of Revolution or Grimm in the time period, but we're just guessing at this point.

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Of note, there's no mention of Animal Practice or Up All Night, as both have really struggled in September, and encore episodes which had been scheduled have been replaced with encore episodes of Grimm and Revolution.

The orders are especially early, well before the fall season
competition generally settles in; but NBC has had so little success in
prime time lately that it needs to show some confidence in its new
entries.

The announcement also serves to bolster the entertainment
division regime headed by the top program executives, Bob Greenblatt
and Jennifer Salke, who were responsible for selecting the network’s
fall slate of shows.

If I were a gambling man, I would give Animal Practice about 2 more weeks before it starts getting the "Titanic deck chair shuffle."